Today, we commenced legal proceedings in the Federal Court against Woodside Energy.
I wanted to make sure we alerted you to this breaking news as early as we could.
If we win, we will set an urgently-needed legal precedent – climate impacts must be considered under our national environment law.
Woodside Energy's Scarborough Gas Project and its Pluto extension is one of the most polluting new fossil fuel proposals in Australia. If it goes ahead, it would result in yearly climate pollution equal to the annual pollution from 15 coal-fired power stations!
And to make matters worse, they plan to build it on one of the most captivating marine environments in the world and in an area of immeasurable significance to First Nations Peoples. The Burrup Peninsula is part of the Dampier Archipelago in the north-west of Western Australia – a thriving coastal wonderland, where there is no place for gas.
Our case in the Federal Court aims to stop the Scarborough Gas Project in its tracks, until its climate impacts are properly assessed!
This is a disaster for nature and a methane bomb waiting to be detonated and We won’t sit by and let it happen. Please help us take Woodside Energy to the Federal Court.
In order to access this toxic fossil gas resource, Woodside plans to dredge the seabed, and hammer giant concrete piles into the ocean floor, before dumping millions of tonnes of seabed spoil across the Archipelago.
The Scarborough project would cause immensely disruptive activity, which is a serious risk to life for the turtles, dolphins, dugongs and migrating humpback whales who call these waters home.
But shockingly, Woodside Energy has already been given state-based environmental approvals and will shortly commence the construction phase.
So we are taking this up to the Federal Court. And we need you with us. Can you help?
We’ll be arguing the Scarborough Project’s enormous greenhouse gas emissions will have a significantly detrimental impact on the World Heritage-listed Great Barrier Reef. Therefore, this project should not be allowed to start production without interrogation under our national environment law.
Although the gas would be extracted in waters off Western Australia and much of it burned overseas, it would fuel climate damage that is already bleaching coral a ghostly white on the Great Barrier Reef in Queensland. We know that the use of coal and gas threatens our way of life and the places we love, no matter where they’re burned.
The Scarborough Project was never referred to the Federal Environment Minister for assessment, even though Woodside must know how destructive it will be to our climate and reefs! Gas and oil projects assessed by the National Offshore Petroleum Safety and Environmental Management Authority currently have an exemption from the national environment law.
However, and this is where our legal case comes in, that exemption does not apply if an offshore project is likely to have a significant impact on the World Heritage or National Heritage values of the Great Barrier Reef.
When you have the head of the International Energy Agency saying “climate chaos is guaranteed if proposed oil and gas mega-projects go ahead”, it makes you wonder how these sorts of destructive projects are being approved in the first place.
A case as large as this can cost upwards of hundreds of thousands of dollars. Will you please donate so we can confidently take Woodside Energy to court and make sure the impact on the Great Barrier Reef is considered before drilling starts?
If we win this case, and we are hopeful we will, this will draw a line in the sand that the climate impacts of projects – whether offshore or onshore – must be assessed under our national environment law.
In the times we're in, no polluting gas project should be allowed to proceed without consideration of the climate impact on the precious Great Barrier Reef.
And we won’t stop until we have exhausted all legal options to get the climate consequences of this project properly considered.
Together, we can set an important precedent for the future.
Read more: Woodside's Scarborough project explained
Header photo: Violeta Brosig/Blue Media Exmout
